Chapter 1
My life had changed much less than I would have liked.
Most of my romantic relationships were still short-lived, and I was still renting the same apartment, splitting expenses with my three friends.
Bukowski was on his last legs, and my mother still insisted on meddling in my life, even from afar.
She sent daily text messages (colorful Good morning GIFs, Care Bears, and motivational phrases), called twice a week, and visited me every quarter.
If you’ve never experienced this, you don’t know the true meaning of the word nuisance.
No doubt, living in Rio de Janeiro was better than living in Pingo d’água.
But I couldn’t say I was happy. Disappointed was maybe more accurate.
I had a degree and had dropped my country accent.
Now that I’d graduated, I hoped to find a job at a good company, save up enough money to start my own business, and maybe feel somewhat accomplished before the age of thirty.
Flashy success really only makes sense when you’re young.
Once, on the wall of a public restroom, I saw a poem:
SOMETHING YOU WON’T FIND IN BOOKS
IS THAT VAGINAS FART
There’s a lot of stuff you won’t find in books.
Besides my textbooks, I’ve always liked to read self-help—true stories about people who made it in life.
I read Wise and Powerful Men, Learn to Succeed in Any Situation, For a Successful Man, and Secrets of the Richest Men in the World.
They said nothing about being young and having a business degree with no opportunities.
Nothing about looking for a job in your field and not getting one. Nothing about being ignored.
If you’re not rich, you have nothing. Books don’t tell you that. If your dad doesn’t own his own business, you have nothing. Another thing books don’t tell you. If you don’t have someone to put in a good word for you, you have nothing. Books won’t even tell you that.
I read The Five Characteristics of a Successful Entrepreneur, which are: perseverance, strategic vision, focus, persuasion, and self-knowledge.
I was already persistent, strategic, focused, and persuasive.
I kept a planner for years, made some investments just to get some experience, studied theory and start-up case studies, talked to experts in digital marketing.
What I mean is, I was no rookie—I was prepared for the job market.
But when I graduated, there were no opportunities.
“It’s the financial crisis,” my roommates would say, trying to console me. They were just as screwed as I was.
Hugo had finished culinary school in 2021 and fancied himself a real chef, but he was also a nobody, always jumping from restaurant to restaurant, making peanuts as an assistant cook.
I must admit he had talent, he was a born artist: In 2019, he’d spent six months in Paris on a scholarship at the Centre de Formation d’Alain Ducasse, but his ego alienated him from others.
Hugo still had a lot of floors to mop, a lot of days sweating his ass off and biting his tongue ahead of him, which he had trouble doing.
Focused, persuasive, and persevering, but not at all strategic.
Miguel was doing his residency at a hospital in a far-flung corner of Rio.
He was always taking Bukowski and driving across the city.
He hardly showed his face at the apartment anymore, hardly bathed, hardly ate, hardly saw Rachel, his insufferable girlfriend whom he’d met at the start of med school.
On the rare occasions I did see him, Miguel always looked both exhausted and fulfilled.
Strategic, focused, and persevering, but not at all persuasive.
Finally, there was Piglet. Living up to his nickname, Piglet never graduated and spent all day lying in his reinforced bed, surfing the web and eating potato chips. He’d always been content and easygoing but was neither persuasive nor strategic, nor focused, much less persevering.
I saw then that my friends were doomed to failure, and I was stumbling down the same path.
I had a job at a bookstore in town, and I should have been happy with that.
I liked books and being around them, but the truth was that the customers mostly annoyed me.
They were uninformed or distracted, and would come in asking for “that book with a pink suitcase on the cover” or “that really gory one,” but they never knew the title, the publisher, or even the author.
They wanted me to be a psychic, not a bookseller.
They’d show up with their never-ending lists for school, buy coloring books, and ask for birthday suggestions for their aunt whose tastes they knew nothing about.
Working in a bookstore was a detour from my plans, and I’ve always hated detours.
I didn’t even make a decent living. I hadn’t moved all the way to this city and studied my ass off just to barely make ends meet.
I should have had my nose buried in prep books and practice tests until I passed the civil service exam and got a stable government job.
I’d sent my résumé everywhere, pulled all-nighters studying for specific openings, and, as patiently as I could, waited for something good to happen.
It’ll get better, a voice inside me said. Keep going, work hard, study hard, and things will get better!
I kept going, I worked hard, and I studied hard.
That voice was a fucking liar.